Review policy

Reviews on this site are a ranking input, so their integrity matters to vendors and to agents. This policy follows the ACCC's guidance on online reviews and the terms of every source we use.

Where reviews come from

Every review on the site shows its source. The sources are:

• Google: the public rating and review count for a business, and up to five reviews, displayed with attribution under the Google Places API terms; and, where an agent has connected their Google Business Profile, their full review history.
• RateMyAgent, Facebook and realestate.com.au: only where the agent or their agency has connected the account or authorised syndication.
• First-party: reviews we collect from vendors after a settlement we have detected or they have reported.

We do not copy review text from any website. Reviews we cannot display under licence appear as a rating, a count and a link to the source.

What "verified" means

A review is marked verified only when we can tie it to a real sale we can see in a record: a settlement we detected, a sold listing matched to the reviewer's property, or a source platform's own transaction verification that we can rely on and name. We do not use the word otherwise, and we show the basis of verification on the review.

How we ask for reviews

After a settlement is detected or reported, we send one review request to the vendor, and one reminder ten days later if they have not responded. The request goes to every vendor, in the same words, regardless of how the sale went. We offer no incentive and we do not screen by sentiment. If we invite a vendor to also review the agent on Google, we use the same neutral wording.

What we never remove

A review is not removed because it is negative, because the agent disputes the vendor's opinion, or because the agent is a partner. Ratings are not adjusted.

What we remove

We remove or decline to publish a review that:

• was not written by a person with a genuine transaction with the agent;
• is about a different agent or agency;
• contains defamatory statements of fact that the reviewer cannot support, threats, discriminatory content or personal information about third parties;
• was offered in exchange for a payment or benefit;
• breaches the terms of the platform it came from.

Every removal is logged with the reason. We also remove a review at the author's request.

Right of reply

An agent with a claimed profile can respond publicly to any review on their profile, once, in plain text. Responses are moderated to the same standards as reviews. There is no delete button.

Disputes

An agent who believes a review breaches this policy can report it from their profile with the reason. A vendor who believes their review was wrongly removed can write to reviews@greatrealestateagents.com.au. We respond within five business days. If an agent's reply alleges a factual error, we may ask the reviewer to respond, and we publish both.

Commercial relationships

Partner agents pay us a referral fee on settlement. That relationship is disclosed on their profile and has no bearing on review moderation. Reviews of partner agents and non-partner agents are handled identically, and the review count, rating and verified share feed the ranking in the same way for both.